The present invention relates to a method and apparatus for displaying electronic images on a display screen. More particularly, the present invention relates to a method and apparatus for making an electronic image on a display screen appear as a static or moving work of art (e.g., an oil painting).
Even as digital media and photography become more and more advanced, there remains a strong desire for paintings, particularly watercolors, oils, impastos and the like. Paintings are capable of conveying a feeling to the onlooker that photographs typically cannot. However, photographs are also desirable due to the inherent accuracy and artistic content therein. As a result, attempts have been made to make images, such as photographs, appear as paintings. For example, Photoshop® by Adobe Systems, Inc. allows a user to upload a photograph and add geometric lines (e.g., lines that suggest brush strokes) to make the photograph appear more like a painting.
However, these existing methods, like Photoshop®, depend on pixel-based image processing, and have a limited ability to transform a two-dimensional (2D) image into a natural image such as that a person directly paints. Specifically, it is now recognized that traditional methods are limited with respect to providing effects such as those associated with oil painting, pen illustration, cartoon, template mosaic, and the like to the 2D image.
Other products have been developed which allow a user to add painting-like characteristics to a photograph by adding suggested features, or having the software add those features for the user. For example, Dynamic Auto-Painter by Media Chance Inc. allows a user to upload a photograph, choose a style of an artist (e.g., Monet, Benson), and the software generates the scene in the photograph to mirror the chosen artists style.
U.S. Patent Application No. 20090154762A1 describes an image transforming method of providing an image transformation service by applying a plurality of non-photorealistic transforming effects to an input image of a user, including receiving a request for an image transformation through a wired/wireless network from the user, performing the image transformation at a user's terminal or a server according to a user's circumstance, and creating a resulting image applied with the non-photorealistic image transforming effects. The application further describes that face recognition is applied to assign additional strokes to a face portion of a character in the input image containing the character such that depiction of the character is enhanced. In a step of creating a moving picture, a procedure of creating the result image by applying a template mosaic and oil painting is stored in the form of a moving picture.
The systems mentioned above require a reasonably high degree of user intervention to turn their chosen photograph into a painting-like image, and only focus on electronic filtering to produce the desired effect.
In conjunction with advancements in methods and applications for providing digital media (e.g., videos and/or pictures), major advances in hardware for high-definition viewing of this media have been achieved. Indeed, high-definition flat panel displays such as high-definition liquid crystal display (LCD) televisions have enabled users to compose and view high-definition media as slideshows and the like. Typically, videos and/or pictures are sent to a display from a high-definition image server, rendered, and displayed for a viewer.